Shadows

IT’S BEEN SAID THAT “black and white photography can give certain scenes a striking, timeless quality when done well.” This is particularly true to street photographers, who use light and shadow as whip hand in their images.

I know someone, who is good in street and B&W photography, and she’s a Filipina, who used to work as a nanny in Hong Kong. Xyza Cruz Bacani has gone a long way. She’s been to a lot of places with her forte, doing projects left and right, and sharing lectures about her experiences into the world of monochrome photography.

I like B&W, it’s just a hard nut to crack that’s why most of the time, I find myself straying to landscape, or food, or portrait photography. It requires lines, shadows, and shapes, and it’s difficult to pay attention to those all the time.

The first time I did black and white photography was in Hong Kong. In fact, one of the images I have got exhibited a long time ago in Manila. The exhibit was arranged by avid street photographers in a popular Pinoy rock bar near the University of the Philippines.

That photo was of a Hong Kong resident, who was loading several small tanks of liquefied gas to a waiting delivery truck. I have framed that photo, and it’s still hanging on the wall in our living room.

Light and shadow, lines, curves, patterns are not the only thing to remember when doing monochrome photography. There must also be texture.

Texture is the consistency of the surface detail of the photo, which is often overlooked by photographers. So guilty. The more there are irregularities on top of your image, and as long as they are stable and steady, the more your image becomes visually interesting.

Maybe, after getting a little bit of upper hand in long-exposure photography, it would be a lot of B&W next.